Erling Haaland, the prolific goal scorer for Manchester City, has reached another milestone before the Premier League campaign comes to a close. Haaland has now scored 35 goals in the history of the UEFA Champions League at the age of 22.
At the age of 22 years and 272 days, he accomplished this achievement. Haaland edged past the likes of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo to register his name in this record. At 23 years and 269 days old, Kylian Mbappe, a French phenomenon, is in second place. Just a few days behind Kylian Mbappe, Lionel Messi is in third place. In the Champions League, Messi scored 35 goals at the age of 23 and 307 years.
This is not the only record that Haaland has broken in his debut season for Manchester City. Erling Haaland continued to shatter Premier League records against Leicester City, scoring twice in the first half to bring his league total for the year to 32 goals. With his penalty against the Foxes in the 13th minute, Haaland established a new record for goals in a first-ever 38-game Premier League season.
With his 31st goal, the Manchester City striker has one more than Kevin Phillips, who scored 30 goals for Sunderland in 1999-2000. Twelve minutes later, Haaland capitalised on a through-ball from Kevin De Bruyne to score his 32nd goal, tying Mohamed Salah of Liverpool’s record-setting 38-game season.
In preparation for Wednesday’s trip to Bayern Munich for the second leg of the UEFA Champions League, Pep Guardiola substituted Haaland at halftime. It prevented him from breaking Alan Shearer’s Premier League record of five hat-tricks in a single season.
Haaland needs only two more goals to match the overall record of 34 goals in a season and three to break it. The record for most goals in a Premier League season is held by Andrew Cole and Alan Shearer, who scored 34 goals each in the 1993/94 and 1994/95 seasons, which had 42 games per side. The Golden Boot appears to be an afterthought for the Manchester City player this season.